New Port Richey woman charged with exploiting her dementia-plagued father

NEW PORT RICHEY — A woman was arrested Monday after deputies say she swindled her father, an Alzheimer's patient, out of $10,000.

Kristin Cardwell, 53, tried for the first time in May to get her father's money when she went to Achieva Credit Union and applied for a credit card on her father's account but was declined, a Pasco Sheriff's report states.

She went back in four days later with her father and got a credit card in his name with Cardwell as an authorized user, the report states. The monthly bills were sent to her own P.O. box. The report states she ran up a $10,000 credit bill in four months.

When a denial letter for the first credit card application arrived at the home, her father's wife, also his power of attorney, went to the credit union and later confronted Cardwell.

Cardwell, of 4303 Canna Lily Drive, was arrested on a charge of exploiting the elderly. She has since been released from the Land O'Lakes jail on $5,000 bail.